


Let what will be, be

by SansSerif



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Acceptance, Gen, Homophobia, Homosexuality, Trans Character, Transphobia, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-28
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2019-07-03 16:23:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15822594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SansSerif/pseuds/SansSerif
Summary: To Remus, having secrets is normal. He has accepted who he is, but he cannot trust others to see past the prejudices he believes they have.----Ends in acceptance (but this should never be confused with reciprocity)





	Let what will be, be

Remus was good at secrets by necessity and by nature. So good that he went through first year without worrying too much about being found out. When Dumbledore had arrived on his doorstep three months before school started, Remus had argued that it was too risky.

“The signs are everywhere,” he pointed out in that androgynous voice gifted to just-eleven-year-olds. “Sir,” he added as an afterthought, minding his mother’s firm eye on him.

“Perhaps to one who is so expert on being different,” the headmaster had replied. “But to a class of students all new and eager to find their way, you will find that everyone else is focused on their own eccentricities before yours.”

Dumbledore, with his long experience of the preadolescent, had been right. Remus, hyper-aware of his own mistakes and tells, found he was much better at guessing others’ secrets than they were of his. Monthly disappearances, an unusual habit of slipping into Danish, the unwillingness to undress in the dorms—these quirks were explained away without much questioning. Remus would have died for his friends, but he would be the first to admit than James, Sirius, and Peter were self-centered, perhaps even more than your average young boy. To his eye, trained for details, they missed the obvious signs of abnormalities in the students around them. So Remus became the keeper of secrets, many of them not his own.

 

By second year, Remus had relaxed his vigilance. Slowly he accepted changing his shirt without curtains, not jumping when the others saw deep cuts on his arms. Sirius had welts too, welts that all four of them knew about and by silent agreement never discussed. This silent agreement became a blanket policy that covered Remus, much to his relief. When puberty came, along with a solid dose of panic, Remus quietly left a week early for Christmas hols. If he returned with the habit of mumbling funny words in his sleep and telltale streaks of inexpert obscuring charms that lessened his scars, his friends didn’t mention it. They all knew what it felt like to suddenly have a body that didn’t feel their own and the self-consciousness they wouldn’t admit. It wasn’t until they were cramming for spring exams that Peter sat up with a start, staring across the Astronomy homework spread over his bed at Remus who was half covered by a quilt and wearing only boxers.

“Yo-you are...” Peter spluttered, his eyes wide.

Fear gripped Remus as he scrambled instinctively for concealment and his wand in one motion. James and Sirius looked over in bemusement, dark heads peering through the curtains. In that moment, as Remus felt his world rapidly evaporating, the thought flashed across his mind. ‘Shit, I can’t handle another secret.’ And as his eyes met Sirius’s, he could have sworn the same thought was going through his.

“He’s a what?” James drawled as Remus pulled the covers over his chest and wondered with a panicky mental laugh just which secret was to be revealed.

“A werewolf,” Peter finished, eyes as wide as the moon.

Of course Peter would be the one to figure it out. The Pettigrews were steeped in the scorn of those clinging to what little status they had at the expense of others. Bigotry was a way of maintaining the shredded remnants of their Wizarding aristocracy. As much as Peter tried to emulate the acceptance of James and Sirius, this familial habit had drawn him out of his self-centeredness before the others.

For the first time in his life, words failed Remus. He resisted the urge to hide under the covers, evade the burning stares of the other boys. At least this secret was easy to explain, he thought wildly. The questions could be much more awkward than these.

Sirius, eager to side with any rebel, spoke first. “So?” he demanded, turning on the smaller boy. “He’s Remus.”

“B-but werewolves are dangerous,” Peter quailed under Sirius’s glare.

James eyed Remus. “The only danger you’re in from Remus is him not letting you copy his notes.”

However, as Remus tentatively met their eyes, he could see the puzzle pieces falling into place in their minds too, and knew that easy secret keeping had just ended.

 

Third year passed without event until James developed his obsession with Lily Evans and consoled himself by asking out the brightest Ravenclaw of their year. Sirius, always the eldest, was affronted that James dared mature earlier than him and quickly passed through a series of girlfriends. Peter watched wistfully. Remus kept his head down and his nose in his books. He told himself sternly that it was only the wolf being possessive of his pack that made his gut wrench every time girls joined their nightly homework sessions. The summer before fourth year turned out to be highly educational when a sympathetic aunt asked him to stay in Brighton. There, Remus answered a few quiet questions in dusty bookshops and learned that, as eye catching as they were, James and Sirius were not the only two handsome, dark-haired boys in the world. With a quiet thrill of excitement mixed with dread, he added his first kiss to the growing list of things he could not mention. It wasn’t like he didn’t know that men sometimes liked men. He just thought that his other secrets made him different.

 

Fourth year buzzed with hormones and tentative, smug glances. Remus kept his head down and tried not to think about any of it. His place at Hogwarts was too precarious for experimenting; that’s what summer hols were for. Homework, he firmly reminded himself, came first. OWLs were next year and he needed to work to keep up.

Christmas found the four of them lounging around on the worn couch in front of the Gryffindor fire. James was feeling the soul of magnanimity and Peter, watching him with adoring eyes, egged him on from the hearthrug. Remus, feeling the approaching moon, fiddled with a stray cracker and tried to ignore the conversation.

“Whatever Evans may say, I’m not a snob. I’ll be friends with everyone, one and all.” James swept his arm about to include the empty common room.

“Except Snivellus,” Sirius broke in. “You have  _some_  taste.”

“But you’re friends with us,” Peter said, his tone a little too eager. “Me ’n Remus.”

“Of course I’m friends with you,” James retorted. “You’re eons better than that toerag.”

But something about the exchange grated on Remus. James was just a bit too lofty, a bit too superior. Why did he consider that his friendship was a favor? Remus was no longer an insecure first year, willing to take every scrap of friendship. “You know I have secrets. Why’re you so sure of that?” he looked over, challenging James.

James looked baffled, meeting Remus’s eyes, but Sirius spoke before James could reply. “Well, let’s see,” he drawled. “You aren’t a Slytherin, you’re a perfectly decent human being…”

“I’m not,” Remus shot back. Inside, he was mentally chanting ‘shut up, shut up, shut up,” but tonight his mouth had its own ideas. “You know I’m not.” He stood, towering over them.

“Decent?” Now Sirius looked baffled.

“Human,” Remus replied. He yanked up his sleeve, baring scars.

“But we’ve agreed,” James interrupted. “You’re Remus. You’re our friend.”

“What if I told you my secrets?” Remus stared him straight in the eye. Teenage rebellion flooded his veins, firing him up to say things he would never say in daylight. “What if I wasn’t what you thought I was? What if I’m gay?” The moment he said it, he wished he could take it back. Bravado evaporated, leaving him to face the thick silence. But even if he could lie about his scars, about his body, he knew he could never take that back.

“Are you?” James asked softly.

Remus stared back mutely for one heartbeat, then two, before turning to face the fire. One secret was enough. Why did he have to reveal a second? He could hear Peter scooting backwards, couldn’t bear to look down to watch. “Secrets aren’t meant to be told,” he choked out roughly.

A firm hand landed on his shoulder, twisting him away from the fire, and Remus had to swallow tears as he met Sirius’s unfathomable kind eyes. “Moony, you could love hippogriffs for all I care. For all we care. Right?” Sirius shot the last word as a challenge to James and Peter. James nodded, slow and steady. Peter only stared. “We didn’t abandon you last time. It’s not like this secret is liable to kill us like the last one.”

The joke fell flat but Remus tried to smile. Sirius took it as a gesture of peace. He shoved Remus back onto the couch before dropping down in the middle, throwing his arms over James and Remus. Tucked up against the couch arm, Remus willed the conversation to return to normal. Sirius, however, had other plans. He glanced sidelong at Remus before asking with a smile, “So now that we know why you’re not getting any action with girls, have you shagged a boy yet?”

Remus punched him a bit harder than necessary on the shoulder, cheeks flaming red. “I’m  _fourteen_ , you idiot. Besides, none of your business!”

But Sirius just smirked at him. “Bet I’ll know when you do.”

There was no sensible reply to that, leaving Remus to shake his head and hide his face in his hands.

 

That wasn’t the end of it. Peter took to changing in the bathroom. Sirius, ever the insecure rebel, leered at Remus as he walked out of the shower. James developed tactfulness that the rest of the world wouldn’t see from him for many years yet. A week after the moon, Remus walked in on the three of them huddled in an empty classroom. James and Sirius were obviously pushing Peter to accept this latest surprise. Peter, hero worshipper, was visibly trying to overcome his bias. “…as long as he’s just gay, you know?” Peter whispered. “Not… not the other thing.”

Sirius barked a laugh. “Remus, a girl? He changes with us often enough. We would’ve seen something, Peter mine. We would’ve seen something.”

Remus backed out as silently as he had come, bile in his throat. Acceptance had its limits and he would not lose Sirius’s friendship.

 

Fifth year brought OWLs and animagi. For the first time in his life, Remus looked forward to the moon. Sixth year brought apparition and, most importantly, seventeenth birthdays. They made so many plans for that summer, the first summer they could legally do magic, but Remus refused to commit to any of them. Near the end of the school year, a letter full of funny words that looked like German but weren’t arrived at the breakfast table. Sirius swore it was a love letter because Remus refused to say was it was and slept with it under his pillow. True to his word, Remus disappeared in August and reappeared at King’s Cross station without any explanation for his absence. James and Sirius, conferring, put it down to a new cure for werewolves because they had never seen Remus look so relaxed and cheerful. He was “a whole new Moony,” they teased. “Definitely a love letter,” Sirius said with a slight wistful look. He was the only one who noticed that Remus had stopped performing obscuring charms on his chest and had new scars there, but Sirius put these down to the violence of the moons.

 

In November, Sirius decided it would be a good idea if they kept Remus company during his change. James wasn’t so sure but Peter sided with Sirius. “He sees us change all the time. I want to see him change.” James eyed the usually meek boy with surprise and chalked up his rebellion to a distrust of Remus’s secrets. Sirius confided his own reason later, when he was alone with James. “It hurts him, Prongs. We help him during the moon, maybe we can help him with the pain.” There was so much longing in his eyes that James had to give in. None of them told Remus. The plan didn’t sit right enough for them to do that. They knew what his answer would be.

 

“No.” Remus stood in the Shack, eyes wide as he heard the door open. “No!” He backed away into the corner, hands futilely covering his bare body. Always frugal, Remus knew he couldn’t spare the money for new clothes every moon.

“No…” Sirius was the only one who managed to say something as the three of them stared at Remus naked for the first time in seven years. “Shit, Remus, I thought we were done with secrets!”

“I’m never done with secrets!” Remus shouted, turning to face Sirius with crazed eyes. “Haven’t I told you that often enough? My life is only secrets.”

“We’re your friends. You… you didn’t tell us about this?” Sirius gestured at Remus’s thighs, his voice soaring to a high pitch. “Who the fuck are you, hiding in the boys’ dorm? In my dorm?”

“I’m a man,” Remus shouted back. “I am a man and a wolf and if my body doesn’t look like any of those things that’s none of your business.”

James stepped forward, arm outstretched to keep Sirius back. “We’ve trusted him this long, mate. I think we need to hear him out.”

“No time,” Peter whimpered, and he fell to the ground, twisting into a rat and scampering through the door. Sirius blurred into a dog, hackles raised.

“Prongs,” Remus whispered as he fell to the ground. Already, James could see the amber in his eye and the shudder of changing muscles under Remus’s skin. He stepped forward and gripped Remus’s hand.

“It’s all right, Moony,” he said. “It’s going to be fine. We’re your mates.” And then he let the stag take over as the wolf muzzle appeared, teeth grasping too slowly.

 

James was the first to accept this new secret. Sleek, beloved James, the cat who knew the cream was his due and who could afford to overlook traits in his friends that others found threatening. For once, Remus was grateful for this magnanimity. James didn’t ask any questions, didn’t flinch when Remus touched his hand, didn’t even turn away when changing in the dorms. James was the one who pushed Remus to talk to Sirius. “He won’t come to you,” James pointed out. “Sirius is loyal but he doesn’t ever beg.”

“But he doesn’t want to talk to me,” Remus protested.

James got a queer look in his eye and shook his head. “Why do you think that?”

So Remus found himself out on the highest part of Gryffindor tower, the part accessible only by a door hidden behind their staircase, shivering as he edged towards the huddled mass of Sirius. Wordlessly, Remus sat down to wait. He had come to Sirius. Let Sirius make the next move. Remus wasn’t about to beg either; he had hoped that their friendship meant more than this and he wasn’t above just walking away.

After an eternity of silence, Sirius spoke. “Who are you?” he asked hoarsely, not looking away from the lake. “You’re not Remus Lupin. Who are you?”

Taking a deep breath, Remus followed Sirius’s gaze. “I am Remus Lupin,” he answered, carefully keeping his voice calm. “I’m as much Remus Lupin as you are Sirius Black. I am Remus Lupin, gay werewolf born in the wrong body.” He couldn’t help the bitterness in the last words.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Sirius said plaintively. Remus looked up, startled, and met the other boy’s eyes.

“Because it didn’t matter.” Remus took a breath. “No, that’s wrong. Because it matters more than anything that I’m as normal as possible and so it doesn’t matter as long as I hide it.”

“I want to know.” Sirius didn’t look away. “Christ, Moony, you’re my best friend. I’d die for you. I just want you to trust me.”

In that moment, the world teetered on its axis. Remus bit back the retort of “this is why I didn’t tell you” and reached for the maturity born of too many secrets too young. He looked away and started to speak, words tumbling out before he could stop them. He told Sirius about talking to Dumbledore, about refusing his school uniform until his parents allowed him trousers, of Dumbledore’s calm acceptance of his secrets. He spoke of holidays spent in Denmark where they were testing innovative treatments, of finding people in Brighton who understood. Sirius watched wide-eyed and quiet as Remus told him of spells that hid his body and broke his voice, as Remus stuttered through the final steps of a procedure completed just that summer that flattened his chest permanently, of the decisions he faced in the future about other procedures. The stars were out by the time Remus fell silent, not daring to look over to see Sirius’s reaction.

Finally, a rough hand slipped over his, holding tight. “I thought I’d lost you,” Sirius said roughly. “You’re Moony, see? I thought I knew who you were.”

“I don’t know who I am half the time,” Remus pointed out. “I didn’t know I was gay until fourth year. I have secrets even from me.”

This got a chuckle from Sirius before they both fell silent, staring at the grounds below. Several moments later, Remus heard Sirius gulp, a sure sign he was about to say something he didn’t want to.

“If you were a girl,” he said quietly, causing Remus’s heart to thrill at the acceptance. “Just so you know, Moony, if you were a girl, I’d ask you out in a heartbeat.”

In that moment, Remus remembered Sirius’s questioning look in second year, small coveted glances caught at inappropriate times, and opened his mouth to speak. But then he remembered how frightened Sirius was, beneath all that bluster of rebelling against his family. Sirius could make friends with all sorts of people but Remus knew it would cause Sirius no end of grief to contemplate that he too might be different in a way that the Wizarding world didn’t accept. Maybe, just maybe, this was an acknowledgement of things wished for that would never come to pass. Carefully, Remus laid his hand on top of Sirius’s and pressed down. “Thanks, Padfoot.”

And they both knew what he was thankful for. 


End file.
